Sugar

25

chapter twenty five
florence thompson
song: pretty ugly - tierra whack

Vincent kept to his word, giving me a ride to work and assuring he'd be back at 7 to pick me up from my shift. The car ride over was filled with the music from the radio and incessant teasing from his side of the car, that silly smile still stuck on his lips. I couldn't help but laugh each time he made a silly joke, causing me to shake my head.

When we finally arrived, I was a whole hour late and Ben and Rico were both elated to see me walk through the front door. Rico released a girlish squeal, rushing to wrap me up in his arms in a tight hug. I returned it, squeezing him tightly since I hadn't seen him a whole two days which was practically unheard of lately with how much time we'd been spending together.

"How are you here? Oh, look at that nice car! Oh my god...wait," Rico released me, stepping back and watching as Vincent shifted his ridiculously expensive car into reverse and pulled out of the parking lot. "That was Vincent, wasn't it? Oh my god, Ben told me you went over there last night. He's bringing you to work? Did you guys have sex? Are you kidding me?!" He exclaimed, gripping my shoulders and shaking me harshly as if the information would fall right out of me.

I looked over Rico's shoulder to find Ben chuckling with his back resting against the counter, his arms crossed over his chest. I narrowed my eyes at him.

"What is it, a gossip fest around here?" I waved my arms around animatedly, thanking the heavens that Glenn was right in the fact that today was slow and no one was to be seen in the diner.

"So you did? You finally lost your-,"

"Shut up!" I cut him off before he could reveal the fact that I'm still a super mega virgin to Ben. It's not a huge deal but its also not exactly the type of information you want your high school crush to find out about you. "No, we definitely did not have sex, he just gave me a ride in since my car wouldn't turn on this morning."

"Oh really?" Ben asked from the back, his interest suddenly piqued in our conversation, his full brows raising in surprise. "What's that uh," he motioned towards his own neck, "hickey you got going on?"

It was this moment that I'd realized how royally I'd fucked up.

My eyes immediately widened as I stared at him, remembering last night and the purple bruise Vincent had left on my neck. Nausea waved over me, causing my face to immediately pale. My hands began to clam up, I wiped them quickly on my dress.

Why hadn't he told me?!

Oh, he isn't going to hear the end of this.

I was rushing around so quickly that I'd forgotten to at least throw some foundation over it.

"I got you boo," Rico interrupted, sticking his pointer finger in the air, catching my attention. "I have makeup in my car from that one time I went to a drag show, c'mon," he waved me behind him and we began towards the door, pushing through and heading towards his red car.

He unlocked it, pulling out a purple sparkly makeup bag and unzipping it quickly.

"So, between the two of us, did you lose it?" He asked sneakily, searching through his makeup back and pulling out a light stick foundation. "It was my highlight color," he informed me, pulling the cap off and swiping the stick onto my neck as I craned it.

"I swear to god I did not lose it, Rico," I said, looking at him as he patted the shade into my neck.

"Well somethin' must've happened if you have this bullseye on your neck," he raised his brows, giving me that pointed Rico look with his big brown eyes.